This was exactly what I ordered, and honestly I think it looks better in person. Wasn’t certain which size to get, but after reading some of the reviews and measuring my head, I concluded the large size was for me, and I was right. I will display this on a Roman bust that I have, and maybe wear with a kilt for the occasional costume party, or once a year when I watch Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and pretend to be Colonel Potts. Ha. Anyway, I could not be more pleased with my purchase!

Despite the fact that the pattern is not exactly the same as the British Army Victorian period models, it is a fine copy and anyone who knows about such things will immediately recognize it. The one thing that caused me to deduct a star is the fact that the inner suspension material--a thin and brittle plastic--will, within a few years, crack and no longer hold the sweatband to the helmet. There are no replacement kits to allow the sweatband to be reconnected to the pith helmet so the only alternatives are to to find some sort of thin and strong plastic and reattach the sweatband to the pith helmet body or to buy a new helmet. Because of the low price, it's certainly affordable but I hate to discard the helmet, which is otherwise perfect, because of the failure of the suspension sheet plastic. I also have the African pith helmet version, which also has failed because it utilizes the same thin plastic sweatband connection.
I am a fan of the helmet and several years ago won a costume award wearing the helmet with appropriate attire at the San Diego Comic-con.

Slight error with a Christmastime order wasfixed quickly with a phone call. Would trust again.

When you look at pictures of pith helmets that were British and worn during the 1870’s to about the late 1890’s. The Kitchener pattern or British Foreign Service pith helmet had a rounded beak like front brim up until the 1880’s or 80’s, when they switched to a pointed beak brim instead. Early British Foreign Service pith helmets had a longer brim at the back and were white with a single low band going around the base of the helmet. The problem with the helmet I got from Village Hat Shop was too wide, but was almost accurate to Boer War era British pith helmets. The leather chinstrap is backwards simply because the buckles face your neck when under your chin. This doesn’t mean your supplier must stop production, you just need a more accurate interior head band, narrow the helmets accordingly to the pictures of surviving pith helmets, and improve the chinstrap while reversing it. The Home Service helmet is a story for another time. It’s a ok product at best. Or maybe it was the box that made the pith helmet too wide by putting pressure on the top and bottom. If so, get boxes that don’t reshape the helmets, if possible. -A pithy person, Kaiden.